At a time when the country is grappling with a daily spike in COVID-19 cases, a top jeweller in Hyderabad died after he threw a lavish birthday bash, attended by 100 people at least.
He passed away due to Coronavirus on Saturday. This created a panic among the people who had attended the bash as they rushed to get themselves tested at private labs in the city.
One more attendee who was the owner of another top jewellery chain also died of the same on Saturday. It is being suspected by the officials that he got infected from the host. Just two days after the bash, the host experienced COVID-19 symptoms and was admitted to a private hospital.
The process of contact tracing has begun by the health officials. Director of Public Health G Srinivas stated that:
These are the super-spreaders due to which the number of positive cases has gone up in Hyderabad. In spite of so much publicity, some people just refuse to follow the rules. Birthday parties, family gatherings to celebrate a birth, or youths getting together to welcome a foreign returnee are proving to be hotspots of coronavirus spread. Asymptomatic persons attending huge gatherings like this are spreading the infection
Even Health Minister Etela Rajender shared that he was frustrated.
There is a drastic rise in coronavirus cases in Hyderabad because people are refusing to follow basic rules. Families are hosting birthday parties, organising engagement functions, or getting together at homes to celebrate a new birth. It takes just one among them who is infected to spread the virus to dozens of others and that is what is happening in Hyderabad.
Telangana government accused private labs of not adhereing to the testing norms as prescribed by ICMR which has led to false positives.
We are going to issue notices to 13 private labs which are not following the norms. The issue needs to be evaluated by an expert committee and until then the data of the said lab has been kept under abeyance. If this lab and other labs are found to be violating ICMR rules then we will take strict action against them.
-Director of Public Health Rao
As per sources, Telangana has reported 1,850 fresh new cases and crossed the tally of 22,000 mark for coronavirus cases.